Mercurial » Chronicles from The Island

On brain cells and attention spans

Camilo — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:11:12 +0000

Why is it that work becomes so boring after a while? Why projects remains exciting, no matter how exhausting and demanding? Why is the thrill of a deadline better than the monotonous drone of the routine meeting and the impossible boring coworker?

It is all about you brain cells and their connections. Whenever you (or your activities) create new pathways, life is better, explosive, immersive, brilliant.

Repetitious tasks are death, though, and not only figuratively: they mean that little by little your pathways reduce, and your options disappear, and one day you wake up transformed into a cockroach, afraid of light and with an apple embedded on your body. That’s why meetings are emetic, and projects are exciting, even after the 16 hour a day crunches and the impossible goals: those mean growth.

Painting, as Paul Graham suggests, may have worked for 20th century dictators, but now we need more, a certain definite brain workout, and one that pay s the bills and nourish the soul, one that provides excitement and gold, one that goes along with expansion and learning of new disciplines. We need work for intelligent humans that need to learn.

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Do not go gentle into the good night

Camilo — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 15:50:26 +0000

For no particular reason, Dylan Thomas’ Do not go gentle into the good night:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

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An empty space

Camilo — Wed, 16 May 2007 03:46:11 +0000

Loneliness settles unbid, and my list grows longer.
My life pretends to be easy,
When the only obligation I want escapes me.
What to do? Behave impeccably!

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On not blogging

Camilo — Fri, 06 Oct 2006 09:52:44 +0000

I have achieved the dubious distinction of not writing but once a month! What an honor! As Gaiman says, in a magnificent advocacy of recursion, the best description of the story is the story itself, for it then becomes the whole extension of the reality being mapped through that description.
Hence the lack of blogging: what can I say, there more stories piling up in my todo list everyday, there are a lot of questions there begging to be asked, and yet, I don’t want to be a target because of my thinking and my writing. So, the silence.
Perhaps reality has become too asinine to even consider? Perhaps the world is way too complicated to waste time explaining it; perhaps it is just so simple, that a mere description is already the whole story – and who likes those stories, anyway, in whcih nothing makes sense, nothing happens.
I am waiting for the sirocco to end, so I can finally breathe.

Technorati:
blogging, writing, hiatus, silence

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Dead blogging

Camilo — Sat, 19 Aug 2006 12:06:19 +0000

I finally realized why is it that blogging is such a boring, depressing activity as of lately.
It is as fun as going to the cemetery to converse with old friends, and precisely for the same reasons.
When I first started blogging, four years ago, there were a lot of people already, and of course we newbies stuck together: I would get emails from readers, from Hi Monkey, KaneBlue, Maria, Bea, Ali, Doc, GingerGirl, Dolly, Ggirl, PinkW and others that I don’t remember.
And slowly, one by one, all of them stopped writing. Our medium was the blog, and they left. Now, updating all these links in my blogroll is like picking up old photos, and trying desperately to remember all that people in these, discarded, yellowed, forgotten pieces of paper. What was of the shiny color, the brilliant words, the intriguing tales? Looking through these abandoned domains feels like walking through an empty cemetery, where even the epitaphs are fading.
technorati: blogging

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Eccentric

Camilo — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 10:52:38 +0000

Merlin asks for eccentricities, all those little quirks that made us different from the people around us. That is a travel through a period of self-discovery and self-consciousness: we were inventing our persona.
In high school, and for a while in college, I used to wear only green clothing – nothing but green. I presumed it was due to my environmentalist inclinations, but it was odd – and people thought me militaristic.
And for a long time as an adult I forgot the year of my birthday – I mean, I completely forgot about it: I refused to acknowledge that particular tidbit of information: it was fun being Peter Pan.
Also, when camping, I (and a bunch of friends) used to sing Les Luthiers. All of their albums!
All that is left of my eccentric days is dancing in front of any band every time I see a group, either in the street or at a bar. It helps to have great partners, though.
Is that eccentric?
Technorati: life, gtd

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Advice

Camilo — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 14:01:31 +0000

New year, and with it, thought and introspection.
This, from Matt Howie, on advice and getting old:

maybe life isn’t a journey to uncover new truths in far off places, but instead to simply gain enough to experience to understand what is all around you, all the time.

What a marvelous idea: the answer to whatever ails you is here, within you, around you. There is no need to go around the world to find that solution, but to listen to others already, opening yourself instead of judging and countering with profound witticisms.
Or remember what they said, for example, in a cafeteria at the airport, many years ago.

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Storyboard

Camilo — Mon, 21 Nov 2005 12:45:25 +0000

Create the storyboard to your life, create the possibilities, the dreams, the travels, the knowledge:
Avi Solomon’s advice is as simple as that, to make our relationship with the future we create as compelling and easy to perceive as the very visual result that we intend to achieve.

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Upside of WS

Camilo — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 11:56:35 +0000

Here in WS the great advantage is that I am surrounded by people that know me. So, yes, it is very comfortable.
The downside is that I am already missing somebody else that lives in the 510 area code.
Cool, I know what to do, and only going on the how.

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Leaving San Francisco

Camilo — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 11:56:14 +0000

Should I stay or should I go?

This is my dilemma right now. After the wildest adventure ever, without a formal plan and completely unconnected, trying to get to live in San Francisco has come to a standpoint: Either I leave now, and face the fact that I am nowhere as close to being prepared for this, or I just continue this wild roller coaster, trying to belong in this space.

Never mind the fact that this city is immensely interesting, fetching, and even warm. Never mind that I can actually see myself doing things in this place, knowing people at the pace I have been doing, collaborating and creating.

That is not the point: right now, I have only a big horizon, an unimaginably large space in which to create and invent. Whether here or in Winston-Salem, or in NY, well, it doesn’t matter. I can, I must create a space in which to say things.

Well, where do I stay then, if location is not a subject? As a friend said, the geographic solution is only a temporary one, and an imperfect one at that. But, really, should I enjoy this location? Can I enjoy the thought of traveling from one place to the other? Or should I rather stay put, do what I know, take advantage of my situation and network, and do things!

Dear Hamlet, I do understand that soliloquy now! You were not pondering options, but utterly lost – there is no option there, no possibility of an easy answer, and any decision is bound to be a painful one.

As the British say, get in.

My decision is final in an hour – that much time I have to change or confirm a reservation, and after that it is going to be pretty much survival mode for the next five months, trying to get a definite place and a permanent job, all meanwhile stretching my abilities and my money.

What is this thing, anyway? I am pleasing somebody when leaving this place and when leaving that other one. I am willing to stay to make somebody else happy. I am willing to stay just to pursue that ultimately evasive thing, the ideal position.

I am also willing to leave because there might be something else that I may use and profit from more easily. The grass is always greener, and in this case I have thousands of reasons. Why burn all the bridges? Why stay and try hard to remain in a place that is not safe and not conducive to life?

Oh, I know. I just log in and determine what I have, what I can see in this place. I do a search based on the opportunities available, and from then on decide, based on numbers and probability, which city is more conducive to life.

This whole thing is wrong – I am trying to fit my life to the last resource that I receive, the last call that says that I can do something, the last moment in which I find succor. Where, o where, can I find life? Within, I know, but how deep, and to what expense should I go to do so?

Good things to find in WS: friends, support network, night outs with nothing to do, people just drinking and doing stupid things, some work, and what else, o yes, possibly a position with a good university, and not much else. Things that irk me, the racism, the privilege, the lack of opportunities, the limited options, the extremely localized situation, and that pervasive fundamentalist view of the world.

Good things about San Francisco: warm people, varied, some friends, more possibilities, more universities, higher quality everything, internet everywhere, still a possibility to do some relevant job within my area of expertise.

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